Two Chord Wonder

[Damon R. Mathews]

Hi Everyone! Happy (please, please, please) 2022!

I explore two areas quite a lot: tunes with ridiculouly long chord progression - like 36 bars - the goal being to do it "secretly". To not attract attention to that,

Or: super short chord progressions - the goal - to still make an intersting tune.

This tune has 2 chords (well a dominant chord sneaks in for about a second at one point)

I give the Hammond Organ a pretty good workout. Stand back - it gets quite loud at one point.

My question: the loud part. Exciting or a bit too much?

Thanks y'all.

https://soundcloud.com/marketblandings/20-meter-blues?si=9b0842c03c314bcba3f877d1c676eec8&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing

 

[Ingo Lee]

Only two chords but lot's of inspiration here, you call this jazz well then I'm a jazz fan! The loud part works fine for me; not sure if exciting is what I got there, I'm not a big organ fan no matter what Jimmy Smith says.  Now Raymond Chandler, that's another story . . . .

[Damon R. Mathews]

The Hammond can be an amazing and powerful instrument..... And it can be dorky, too..... And all stops in between.

Thanks for listening and liking!

[H. S. Teoh]

I admit this isn't an idiom I'm familiar with at all, but I liked it nonetheless.

I don't know how to answer whether the loud part is too loud: I usually adjust my speaker volume to the music I'm listening to, so I can't tell the loudness in an absolute sense. :-D  Perhaps if the loud/soft contrast is too big, I might notice, but here I think it doesn't sound jarring, so it can work.  Liked the creative use of vibrato to create interest.

[Damon R. Mathews]

Good, H.S. I was worried I was blowing my audience away a bit.

Thanks so much for listening and helping!

[Sam Umar]

Really liked the vibe here, except maybe the radio chattering on the background. I probably missed the chord progression as you mentioned, perhaps because I enjoyed it too much. It kinda reminded me of an 80's movie or something.

[Damon R. Mathews]

Thanks for listening. Thanks for enjoying!

[Dane Aubrun]

Nice composition. Not much to comment on because it works - no trouble with any loud bits. At first I thought the quieter pianistic passages were too light in contrast but on second hearing they seem to fit well. In spite of just two chords the melodic material carries it forward well - nice chords by the way.

Perhaps just one comment. I found the ending of the "pitched" music at around 3'20" a little abrupt. It just stopped where I was expecting it to fade (as pieces without a formal cadence often do) - in this case to fade back into the concrète component. But you're the final arbiter on it so fine, if it's what you want.

Altogether good.

 

[Damon R. Mathews]

Thanks for your time, Dane.

Good call, by the way. I thought the sudden ending was dramatic - and have doubted it ever since. I think I will do something else.

I keep thinking that the short-wave radio noise and chatter might need defending. But maybe not. I grabbed all that myself, with intention to use in a tune. I thrilled when I caught that guy saying Zero, Zero, Zero. Pure chance.

 

[Harmonius]

I love the short-wave chatter. Great piece!

[Damon R. Mathews]

Thanks, much! It was soooooo fun to find and use it.